Looks like guitar hero or the few other games on the same theme. Are these games really that entertaining? I think I'd get bored with it after about half an hour.
My favorite track for Phase so far is "Erotic City" by Prince. Perfect with the graphics, and the dot pattern for the game is right on the beat, very fast and very challenging.
Another great track is "Fancy Footwork" by Chromeo (I think Groverat gets credit for introducing me to Chromeo). It's got one of the funnest dot patterns and it's easy to relate your rhythmic button mashing with the theme of the song.
Another pretty good one is "Acceptable in the 80's" by Calvin Harris. Obviously I enjoy technotic dance music with the game.
I do, however, have 3 problems with the game, one very serious.
The not so serious problems plaguing the game on my 160GB iPod Classic are the 15-second "stutter" and the weak scroll wheel recognition. The "stutter" problem is a short skip in graphics flow and button input after approximately the first 15 seconds of every song, which causes missed notes about 50% of the time, also sometimes making it impossible to hit the stuttered note on certain tracks, no matter when you press the button. The scroll wheel problem is a general problem with the iPod Classic that a finger on the scroll wheel is not always recognized by the device. Apple really screwed up scroll wheel sensitivity with the Classic, which is also why you can't use cases that cover the scroll wheel with the Classic. This problem causes frequent missing of sweeps in the game. I'm not sure if the 3rd generation Nano or the 5th Generation "iPod with Video" suffer from the same annoyances.
The serious problem is with crashing. This application is totally unstable when saving and resuming a game, or choosing a track when you choose not to resume an interrupted game. The iPod will crash 100% of the time under certain circumstances. I think this is also related to a problem where interrupted games cannot be resumed where the game erroneously claims that the contents of the iPod have changed, and therefore the game cannot be resumed. I'm also not sure if the Nano suffers from this instability.
Otherwise, I still think this game is way better than Peggle, which is fun but it's simply not as feverishly exciting.
That's the other thing about Phase. To really enjoy it most, you have to be good enough to play the game on at least the "hard" level. Once you complete a marathon on "hard", you unlock the "expert" level. If you complete "expert", you graduate to the final level, "insane", which has the same dot pattern as expert, but the accuracy requirements are especially unforgiving.
Warning: it can be addictive enough to make you want to play for hours, and it can be super frustrating so you'd better warn your family to prepare for sudden bursts of swearing at the machine, especially if you're playing with headphones.
I found a work-around for the "stutter" problem. Just after each track starts, pause the track and wait for it to load (it seems the "stutter" happens as part of the track loading process) then continue.
Comments
Looks like guitar hero or the few other games on the same theme. Are these games really that entertaining? I think I'd get bored with it after about half an hour.
It's good, but Peggle is much better.
I guess it really depends on how much you like music and whether the kind of music you like works well with the game.
Another great track is "Fancy Footwork" by Chromeo (I think Groverat gets credit for introducing me to Chromeo). It's got one of the funnest dot patterns and it's easy to relate your rhythmic button mashing with the theme of the song.
Another pretty good one is "Acceptable in the 80's" by Calvin Harris. Obviously I enjoy technotic dance music with the game.
I do, however, have 3 problems with the game, one very serious.
The not so serious problems plaguing the game on my 160GB iPod Classic are the 15-second "stutter" and the weak scroll wheel recognition. The "stutter" problem is a short skip in graphics flow and button input after approximately the first 15 seconds of every song, which causes missed notes about 50% of the time, also sometimes making it impossible to hit the stuttered note on certain tracks, no matter when you press the button. The scroll wheel problem is a general problem with the iPod Classic that a finger on the scroll wheel is not always recognized by the device. Apple really screwed up scroll wheel sensitivity with the Classic, which is also why you can't use cases that cover the scroll wheel with the Classic. This problem causes frequent missing of sweeps in the game. I'm not sure if the 3rd generation Nano or the 5th Generation "iPod with Video" suffer from the same annoyances.
The serious problem is with crashing. This application is totally unstable when saving and resuming a game, or choosing a track when you choose not to resume an interrupted game. The iPod will crash 100% of the time under certain circumstances. I think this is also related to a problem where interrupted games cannot be resumed where the game erroneously claims that the contents of the iPod have changed, and therefore the game cannot be resumed. I'm also not sure if the Nano suffers from this instability.
Otherwise, I still think this game is way better than Peggle, which is fun but it's simply not as feverishly exciting.
That's the other thing about Phase. To really enjoy it most, you have to be good enough to play the game on at least the "hard" level. Once you complete a marathon on "hard", you unlock the "expert" level. If you complete "expert", you graduate to the final level, "insane", which has the same dot pattern as expert, but the accuracy requirements are especially unforgiving.
Warning: it can be addictive enough to make you want to play for hours, and it can be super frustrating so you'd better warn your family to prepare for sudden bursts of swearing at the machine, especially if you're playing with headphones.